Silhouette in Scarlet (5 page)

While I pursued this depressing train of thought, Leif watched me intently. After a while he said, ‘I believe you.’

‘Thanks a heap. I’d like some dessert, please.’

‘Certainly.’ He waved at the waiter and watched benevolently as I consumed something consisting primarily of whipped cream and custard. ‘I like to see a woman who enjoys her
food,’ he announced.

I glanced at him, licking custard off my upper lip, but he wasn’t being funny. ‘You are right,’ he went on. ‘I should not spoil your vacation. I apologize. Let me make
amends. I will show you some of the night life of Stockholm.’

Things were looking up. I smiled at him. ‘I’d like that.’

There was one minor contretemps, when I hauled my purse out from under the table and checked, as I always do, to make sure the contents were intact. I can never get the darned thing closed
– I carry too many things in it – so I was not surprised to find that several items were missing. ‘My passport,’ I exclaimed.

Leif eyed the bulging, obscene object critically. ‘You should keep it always in your hands.’

‘It’s too big.’ I peered under the table, then shied back as I found myself nose to nose with Leif. His eyeballs gleamed like boiled eggs in the gloom. They looked absolutely
disgusting.

‘As I thought,’ he said, fumbling around the floor. ‘Passport, lipstick, comb . . . What in God’s name is this?’

I couldn’t tell. It was too dark under the table. We both came up into the light and Leif handed me my belongings, including the object that had prompted his horrified inquiry. I
didn’t blame him; it must have felt like something long-dead and rotten. I am particularly addicted to a variety of pastry made by a certain bakery in Munich. It’s like a jelly
doughnut, but squashier. I had forgotten it was in there.

‘Sorry,’ I said, retrieving the collection and putting it in my bag. Leif started to lick his fingers, then thought better of it and wiped them on his napkin. ‘Is everything
there?’ he asked, with the doggedly patient look men get when they deal with women’s purses.

‘I think so. No, wait – my notebook.’

We crawled around under the table for a while without success. The waiter watched our activities with poorly concealed alarm; when I explained, he joined the search. Finally he said
breathlessly, ‘Perhaps it has been kicked away, under another table. If you would like me to look . . .’

‘There was nothing important in it,’ I said. ‘If it turns up, hang on to it. I’ll look in next time I’m in the neighbourhood.’

‘Are you sure you don’t wish to continue searching?’ Leif asked, as we started for the door.

I reassured him. The notebook was new; it contained nothing except a few addresses and miscellaneous notes.

The evening turned out to be a success after all. First we went to a jazz pub – ‘with jazz,’ as the advertisement carefully specified. Then we went on to a nightclub and
danced. Leif was a marvellous dancer. For so large a man his movements were extraordinarily economical and controlled. After-wards we took a walk along the waterfront The white boats lifted at
anchor and the long lights shimmered across the water. We held hands as we walked, and we didn’t talk much. When we finally turned back towards the hotel I had almost forgotten J. Smythe; if
I thought of him at all, it was to thank him for inadvertently making it possible for me to meet Leif.

Though the hour was well after midnight, the ground floor windows of the restaurant and bar were brightly lit, and people streamed in and out of the main doors. Leif escorted me to the desk and
waited till I asked for my key. When the clerk handed it over, he also gave me a small sheaf of messages.

‘There were several calls, Dr Bliss. If it is urgent, our switchboard will be open.’

Leif had stood to one side like a little gent, pretending not to listen when I mentioned my room number. Curiosity got the better of him when he saw the messages.

‘I hope nothing is wrong,’ he said.

I held the papers up so he could read them. ‘They’re all from Schmidt. Head of the National Museum, as you surely must know.’

‘Vicky, you do not need to convince me – ’

‘Just thought I’d mention it.’

‘He seems to want you very badly.’

‘I know what he wants. It’s not important. Well . . .’

I stuffed the notes in my purse and turned from the desk. Leif bowed stiffly. ‘Good night, Vicky. Sleep well.’

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Good night. And thanks.’

‘May I telephone you tomorrow?’

‘Yes, you may.’

He bowed again, turned on his heel, and strode away, moving with military precision.

Feigning personal interest is one way of keeping tabs on a suspect. I preferred to believe he wasn’t feigning. He was a gorgeous sight as he made his lordly way through the lesser mortals
in the lobby; his flaxen hair clung to his head and covered the nape of his neck like a gilt helmet.

The pleasures of the past few hours had not let me forget certain other matters. I went into my room with all the panache of the Cowardly Lion, an inch at a time, and I didn’t relax until
after I had searched every corner. No one was there. As far as I could tell, no one had been there.

Four of Schmidt’s messages were labelled ‘Urgent.’ Before I called him, I had a nice leisurely bath and made myself a cup of coffee with my handy plug-in electric pot. Schmidt
is something of a night owl, and besides, I didn’t particularly care whether I woke him up. He had his nerve, harassing me when I hadn’t even been gone a day.

Naturally I called collect. He wanted to talk; he could pay. He accepted the call without so much as a gulp, and it was then that I began to think I had been mistaken about his reason for
calling.

He didn’t even say hello. ‘What are you up to now?’ he shrieked. ‘What is it you think you are doing? A little holiday, you say. The land of your ancestors, you say. You
betray me, you lie to me – your friend, your benefactor, your – ’

‘Wait a minute! I didn’t lie to you, Schmidt. Would I do a thing like that?’

‘Yes.’ He stopped to catch his breath. When he resumed he had evidently decided to try subtler tactics. His voice wheedled. ‘Is it a case like the Riemenschneider, my dear
Vicky? Another prize for our museum?’

He was referring to an art object by a medieval German sculptor, which I had located after it had been lost for four hundred years. I had met Schmidt during that bizarre business, and though I
would be the first to admit that I had a certain amount of assistance in my quest (none from Schmidt; he was a first-class nuisance from beginning to end), my success had given him an exaggerated
idea of my abilities.

‘No.’ I made the negative as convincing as I could. Once Schmidt got a notion in his big round bald head, nothing less than a blunt instrument could get it out. I didn’t want
him rushing off to Sweden to join in the fun. Where the museum was concerned, he was almost as crooked as John. The two of them together . . . Well, the very idea made cold sweat pop out on my
brow.

‘I resent your attitude,’ I went on. ‘You have no right to make accusations.’

Usually Schmidt crumples up when he is attacked. Not this time. ‘You tell me it is nothing that today I should hear from three persons calling themselves cousins and wishing urgently to
find you? Never in all these years has one cousin called. Now it is three in a single day.’

‘I have about two hundred cousins,’ I said, after a moment’s thought ‘We’re a prolific family.’

‘Three? In one day?’

‘Did they leave their names?’

‘Oh, certainly. One was Cousin Bob.’

I have a Cousin Bob. Last I heard he was living in Chicago with his fourth wife and holding down three jobs in order to keep up with his child-support payments. As I said, we are a prolific
family. It was barely conceivable that Bob might be in Europe, but it was damned unlikely.

‘That’s one,’ I said encouragingly.

‘Number two was Cousin George.’ Schmidt’s voice dripped with sarcasm.

I really do have a lot of cousins. I could not recall one named George.

‘That’s two. Didn’t anyone give a last name?’

‘Number three did so.’ Schmidt sounded genuinely puzzled. ‘He was different from the others, Vicky. He was the first to telephone, and when he said he was the Swedish cousin
whom you planned to visit, I thought only that you had missed one another.’

A hideous qualm passed through me, surpassing in hideousness all the minor qualms I had felt in the course of the day. I croaked, ‘I hope to God you didn’t tell him where I was
staying.’

‘You take me for an old fool? I told him I could not do that, and he was most gracious. Indeed, he was kind enough to approve. He was glad, he said, that you had so careful and sensible a
friend.’

‘Thanks, Papa Schmidt,’ I said sincerely.

‘Bah,’ said Schmidt. ‘He was an old papa too, Vicky. At least his voice sounded like that of an elderly man, and he gave to me not only his name and address but references from
everyone except God.’

‘What?’

‘You don’t hear me? His name is Gustaf Jonsson.’ He spelled it. ‘Was not Johnsson your mother’s name?’

‘My father’s mother. How did you know that? You’ve been snooping in my files again, Schmidt.’

‘Mr Gustaf Jonsson told me,’ Schmidt said stiffly.

I apologized. Schmidt does snoop, sometimes looking for rough drafts of Rosanna’s future adventures (little does he know I make them up as I go along), and sometimes out of general
inquisitiveness. I don’t mind. It keeps him happy.

‘Hmph,’ said Schmidt, when I had abased myself sufficiently. ‘Have you a pencil? I give you the address and telephone of Mr Jonsson. He asks that you call him.’

I reached for my purse and then remembered my notebook was no longer in it. I wrote the information on the back of one of the messages.

‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Thanks.’

‘I hope you have cause to thank me,’ Schmidt said ominously. ‘Vicky, I am not happy about this.’

I wasn’t happy about it either. However, I tried to sound more puzzled than alarmed as I questioned Schmidt about my callers. He couldn’t tell me much more. ‘Bob’ and
‘George’ both had ordinary voices, without any accent Schmidt could distinguish. Neither had pressed him for further information after learning that I was out of the country and was not
expected back for several weeks. By contrast Mr Jonsson had been absolutely loquacious. He really had given Schmidt references – two banks and a former minister of state.

‘Well, it’s all very mysterious,’ I said. ‘I appreciate everything you did, Schmidt – and everything you didn’t do. I’ll be in touch.’

I didn’t expect to get rid of him that easily, and I didn’t. Admonitions, warnings, and suggestions gushed out of him. Finally I hung up.

I got up off the bed where I had been reclining and went to the window. My room was in the front of the hotel, overlooking the quay. I suspected I owed that choice location to Schmidt’s
influence.

Directly opposite, the ‘City Between the Bridges’ filled its island from shore to shore, its close-packed structures rising in successive tiers. It looked like a single giant
building, a citadel or castle, with a thousand lighted windows, and the dark water, streaked with splinters of reflected light, might have been a protective moat.

It was so beautiful I forgot my troubles for a minute and just enjoyed the view. Then I turned my attention to more practical matters, noting with approval that my room was on the fourth
(European) floor, and that the nearest balcony was a considerable distance away, below and to the right. The street and the quay in front of the hotel were bright as daylight. Nobody could get at
me by way of the window unless he was a human fly. Which John might well be, but being also a cautious man, he would hardly risk crawling up the front of a fully lighted building in plain view of a
hundred people.

John was the first person I thought of when Schmidt started listing unknown ‘cousins.’ On second thought, however, I doubted that he had been one of them. He wouldn’t call
himself Bob or George; he’d have given some crazy name like Agrivaine. Also, there was no reason for him to check up on my whereabouts. He knew where I was. He had seen me. No doubt he had
also seen the label on my suitcase; he had eyes like a vulture’s.

Leif might have been one of the ‘cousins,’ checking to make sure that the woman he had seen at the airport carrying Dr Victoria Bliss’s bags was the real Victoria Bliss and not
a ringer. But that didn’t make sense either. If he was a policeman, he could inquire through official channels without inventing unimaginative names. If he was a policeman . . .

I would have liked to believe that Bob and George were John and Leif. The alternative, that several parties unknown and probably inimical were on my trail, was distinctly unpleasant. Most
peculiar of all was Cousin Gustaf. Should I get in touch with him? First I thought I would. Then I thought I had better leave well enough alone. Then I decided I would go to bed and let my
subconscious wrestle with the dilemma. I have a great deal of faith in my subconscious. Sometimes it’s the only part of my brain that works.

Chapter Three